71 MG Tech | How To Fit a Distributor Drive Gear on MGA or MGB 

Still helpful 15 years later! I was 5 back then! Thanks John Twist.

So much valuable info in just 9 minutes, thanks John!

I was putting the drivegear in like you said and found the rotor was pointing to the 8 Oclock. After checking everthing I found the gear to be installed correctly. I then found the point cam and advance weights had been taken off and put back on 180 out. Took me several hours to figure it out. I think someone did this to correct having the drivegear 180 out during a previous rebuild. Thanks John DeVries

Great video..huge help. Thank you

Very clear explenation. Thanks

I've hever heard an American say "Bugger" i thought that was very British, just like the cars,excellent.

thanks a lot! excellent video!

John..Mines backfiring from the exhaust and wont fire since the engine rebuild. Hopefully this is causing the problem . Thanks

Aha Ha! So that's why my distributor drive gear won't come out. I'll have to try that when I get home tonight.

Great Video. I Myself tinker around with My old 1968 VW. What you demonstrated is very much on par with setting up spark plug #1 on a VW. The firing order of an old VW is 1-4-3-2. I dont know what order MGs fire at. Also do these MGs use a Bosch Dizzy. I have removed the points from My VW dizzy and gone to electronic and have never looked back. Have you also converted MG dizzy to electronic ignition.

BEWARE! If you don't have a long enough bolt to feed the drive gear into the hole precisely, it is possible to drop the gear into the sump.

hi there,great vid.can you tell me how much play(if any) should there be with the distrbutor drive once its in position?. thanks mark

OK - I might be a tooth off. I am assuming that since the distributor turns anti-clockwise, turning the gear in the same direction would advance the timing. Presently, my timing is about 20 degrees after dead center. Anyone have a thought on this?

Has anyone managed to do this while the engine is in the car? I'm having a hard time getting all the needed tools in a useful position in order to extract the drive gear. It's a 1973 MG BGT.

Pour mg 350 van you help me for delco thinks